At the time of first viewing this small screen adaptation of Charlotte Brontë’s romance, it was my sixth Jane Eyre. There were disposable ones, for film in 1996 (with Charlotte Gainsbourg if anything too pallid), for TV the same year (so mediocre even Sam Morton couldn’t do anything with it), and way back in 1934, with hardly any budget, a poor Jane from Virginia Bruce and a bored Rochester from Colin Clive. Then there had been the George C.Scott version in 1970, in which his Rochester dominated all (Susannah York was Jane, in case you forgot) and another TV take in 1983, with future Bond Timothy Dalton as Rochester. Essentially, screen history would not be one jot the poorer without the lot of them. (more…)

Whenever I think of this trademark Lubitsch soufflé, I recall a tale told by Leslie Halliwell when, the morning after its debut showing on British television in 1983, he discussed the film with a neighbour, who said they turned it off as they didn’t like Jeanette MacDonald’s acting. He observed, in recollection, how can one explain sunlight to a blind man?

What’s ironic is that the film hasn’t been seen on British TV in any form in two decades and until recently seeing it – as with his other pre-code masterpieces, The Smiling Lieutenant and Trouble in Paradise – was virtually impossible unless you either spotted a copy on ebay or emigrated to the US. It’s a story that Lubitsch knew well, for it was a reworking of his 1924 silent The Marriage Circle, and it concerns the romantic complications of Parisian doctor André Bertier. He’s married to Colette, he loves Colette, he’s crazy about Colette, but things start to take a turn for the worse when his wife informs him that her best school friend, Mitzi, is on the way to visit. (Suffice it to say that not since Amelia Sedley and Becky Sharp has there been a more treacherous ‘best friend’.) Mitzi immediately sets her sights on André, not realising her professor husband is onto her unfaithfulness and has employed a private detective to spy on her. (more…)

Both Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless and Billy Wilder’s Apartment were produced in 1959 and released in 1960. The former is widely regarded as a decisive change in the history of film; the latter is seen as an above-average comedy. The dialogue and physical incident of each boil over to the point of a close continuum of cinematic disturbance. Godard, in a Cahiers du Cinema piece, attempts to shake loose from that implication. But it’s not so easy to be done with the shared arteries of this transportation process; and its obtaining, far from a drag, may be seen to comprise a means to illuminating the powers of both efforts. Godard’s protagonist, “Michel,” in addition to being a flip murderer and thief, reveals himself to be a hit-and-run critic, himself being among the many targets he sprays. His first move is to tell us, “After all, I’m an asshole.” When speaking for himself (and his clique of brethren, modestly designated, “the New Wave”), Godard adopts Michel’s free-floating resentment toward the planetary cast of characters. Hence:

“After seven of itching, he [Wilder] decided to no longer bring tragedy to the joke, but on the

contrary to bring the comic to the serious. He took out an insurance policy on cinematographic

René Clair is a definitive example of the director who has been through the full hyperbole of critical opinion. His films were originally seen as groundbreaking and as a director of feather light comedies he was unsurpassed. However, in the eighties and nineties he became unfashionable and, in my opinion, this was simply down to one thing; availability. Clair’s best films, that is to say A Nous la Liberté and Le Million, were never seen in the UK and very rarely in the US (and even then in faded insufficiently subtitled prints) so that if critics were mentioning him at all it was for his later American films. Though I Married a Witch, It Happened Tomorrow and And Then There Were None were marvellously enjoyable entertainments (two of the three are listed here), they were not as innovative as his French work. The same thing happened to the contemporary Lubitsch in America, who is now fêted for Ninotchka and Heaven Can Wait, rather than for the real ‘Lubitsch touch’ films of the early thirties because they were never seen and his later films were. But it had become unfashionable to like Clair, just as Carné and the poetic realists became unpopular with the Cahiers du Cinema generation.

The fact is that they do Clair an injustice to slight him. Nowadays A Nous laLiberté is known mainly for its being copied by Chaplin in Modern Times and, for sure, there are many marked similarities. But it could be argued that Clair himself borrowed from Chaplin, not only his shorts but in the central relationship, which is reminiscent of Chaplin and Mack Swain in The Gold Rush (as well as Chaplin and Harry Myers in CityLights, though Clair could not have seen that while making his film). The story follows two convicts as they are about to bust out of prison, only for one of them not to make it. The one who escapes to freedom slowly becomes a powerful phonograph magnate, while his friend is eventually released to unemployment and misery. That is until he gets a job at the very plant owned by his old friend… (more…)

The positioning here of Roy del Ruth’s original take on the Dashiell Hammett classic shouldn’t be mistaken for an act of preference. No-one could say that it was as good as the immortal Huston/Bogie version a decade later, and yet stranded on the desert island with these good companions by my side, there would be a gnawing itch at the back of my head while I was watching Bogie send Mary Astor over; an itch with a distinct smell of pre-code sex and sin. So that while I’d always take the remake over the original, only by being greedy and taking both would the itch go away.

For a time it lay almost forgotten, not helped by being known under the ho-hum title of Dangerous Female when showing on US TV. It’s true, it moves differently to the later film, and it’s also two reels shorter. The plot is the same, probably more so, and shows Sam Spade having an affair with his partner Miles Archer’s wife Ida, seeing Archer get killed on a somewhat dubious job for a mysterious young woman called Ruth Wonderly, and Sam get put into the spotlight as chief suspect by the somewhat dim-witted flatfoot Lundy. Sam and Ruth wind up having an affair in the aftermath, when it transpires her cover story was just that and her real motive was the recovery of a priceless black statuette of a Falcon, worthy millions of dollars and also the motive for murder of a group of three crooks led by the portly Caspar Gutman. (more…)

Nearly eighty years on, the star vehicles of Eddie Cantor now seem to belong to another era, rather like the Danny Kaye vehicles a decade later. The comparison is not idly invoked as both were the flagship comedic talents of Samuel Goldwyn in their respective eras. And there’s even a link from Kaye back to Cantor by way of homage which seems to have been missed by most reviewers. Cantor’s star reign was from around 1930-1935, like many other comedians he lost his lustre with the killjoy enforcement of the hays Code. He would make a comeback in the likes of Thank Your Lucky Stars and Show Business, the latter the first of a successful partnership with Joan Davis, but they’re diluted, almost self-mocking Cantor. Despite the incidental pleasures of Whoopee (in which he sang ‘Making Whoopee’ as only he could), The Kid from Spain and Kid Millions, there’s only one of his films that comes close to the level of classic.

Eddie plays Eddie, living in West Rome, a small American town with corrupt politicians trying to put up prisons and museums of Roman artefacts and evicting the local poor in the process. Eddie stands up for them and gets himself marched to the city limits and told to keep walking. This he does, but a mile or so outside town he imagines himself back in Ancient Rome (after one assumes a bang on the head). Sold to friend of the people Josephus in a slave auction, he quickly finds himself in trouble with the tyrannical emperor Valerius. After a flirtation with the lions and then with torture, he finds himself food taster at the Imperial Court, a position so precarious it amounts to being an ‘Official Sacrifice’. Throw in an English princess blackmailed into being the emperor’s concubine and an empress trying desperately to poison her husband. (more…)

Irene’s bark was worse than her bite. What was initially seen as a monster hurricane as menacing as any in well over a hundred years, was downgraded to a tropical storm, that was mainly notable for it’s eight-to-ten inch rain, and a wind display that was no worse than medium-strength noreasters. But those of us living in the NYC area aren’t gloating by a long-shot. We’re actually grateful the prognosticators overplayed their hand, rather than the other way around, especially as the most dire forecasters had envisioned downed power lines, falling trees and flooded homes. A little bit of each did occur in a number of areas, but thankfully not in Northeast New Jersey and in the city, where Maurizio Roca, Joel Bocko and Bob Clark are presently residing. Here in Fairview, New Jersey, power stayed on all through Saturday night, into Sunday, and only a nagging house leak in our first floor bedroom was a reminder of the storm’s wrath. As I pen this part of the diary, the storm is practically gone, heading in a diminished state to New England, leaving behind dampness and overcast skies. Monday and Tuesday will be sunny days according to weathermen. But the harrowing experience made everyone wiser to cope with nature’s surprises and threats to our way of life. It’s an episode that brings to mind what was recently, suffered by our friends in Tokyo and New Orleans, and how everything must truly be placed in the proper context. I’d like to thank my dear friend Dee Dee, and so many others who asked for updates during the night and offered their well-wishes: dear people like Laurie Buchanan, Terrill Welch, Pierre de Plume, Michael Harford, Maurizio Roca, John Greco, Tony d’Ambra, Jamie Uhler, Joel Bocko, Craig Kennedy, Sachin Gandhi, Pat Perry, Judy Geater, Jaime Grijalba, Jim Clark, Jon Warner, Jason Marshall, R.D. Finch, Roderick Heath, my very good friend Alan Hardy at the Film Forum, Branko C., and of course Alan Fish, and several others. I beg everyone’s indulgence too for the incessant updates, which I could well understand coming off as redundant and a supreme annoyance.

The musical countdown is well underway, and the comments are flying in fast and furious. It’s been great to have Dee Dee’s remarkable sidebar contributions, which have unearthed some amazing foreign posters of the selections, and links to some of the more renowned clips, and essays from guest writers Brandie Ashe, Kevin Deany and Brian (a.k.a. Classic Film Boy) as well as Judy Geater’s stellar piece on Guys and Dolls, which inspired one of the site’s all-time monter threads. The site remains deeply indebted to Richard “R.D.” Finch, of The Movie Projector for his spectacular work in promoting the project, finding writers, and offering up his usual brand of incomparable thread comments that get right to the heart of every film and essay presented. His work for WitD deserves a medal. He’s been a long-time friend, and his own site writing has been exceedingly first-rate, but only now have we seen the true breath of his kindness and unwavering support. His inspiration and ceaseless energy will never be forgotten, and are prime reasons why the countdown has gotten off to such an extraordinary start. Today’s selection is a repeat of an Allan Fish review that originally appeared in the still-running pre-code series of the delightful Roman Scandals, which I recently saw at the Film Forum’s “Pre-Code” Festival. (more…)

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Wonders in the Dark is a blog dedicated to the arts, especially film, theatre and music. An open forum is highly encouraged, as the site proctors are usually ready and able to engage with ongoing conversation.